County Approves Home For Abused Children

July 25, 1985|By Terry Osinski of The Sentinel Staff

SANFORD — A group home for abused and neglected children won county commission approval this week over opposition from nearby residents who complained that the center would bring undesirables into their neighborhood.

Commissioners Tuesday unanimously approved a special exception to allow the CHARLEE (Children Have All Rights: Legal, Educational and Emotional) program to build a group home on a 1-acre site at the corner of Francis Street and Oak Drive near Altamonte Springs. The home, which will include a set of parents and six children between the ages of 6 and 17, will be the first of three proposed for Seminole County.

The commission's decision to stand behind the board of adjustment approval of the request met with tears of joy from CHARLEE representatives and grousing from some of the 65 people who signed a petition against the home's location. Patricia Layman, who appealed the board of adjustment decision, said the CHARLEE children would ''exert the wrong influence on children in the neighborhood and bring in undesirable traits.''

Other residents voiced fears of increased crime, lower property values and further emotional damage to the CHARLEE children.

''I'm worried about these kids being brought into a neighborhood where they're not wanted,'' said Dorothy Siddons, 190 Eileen Drive. ''They'll be ostracized by the other kids and parents.''

Dr. Kent Hayes, co-director of the CHARLEE program, said he has witnessed similar neighborhood reaction in the placement of most of the 42 CHARLEE homes in eight states and Washington, D.C. The group home concept began in 1965.

''Nobody ever wants us,'' Hayes said. But the negative response typically turns into community support once people have a chance to see how the program works, he said.

Circuit Judge Kenneth M. Leffler gave his endorsement of the project, saying there is a shortage of homes to place abandoned, abused and neglected children. If Seminole County children cannot be placed in temporary foster homes in the county, they are sent to a home in Orange or Volusia county, he said.

''It's time we stopped treating these kids as hazardous wastes, shipping them from one location to another before shipping them out of the county,'' Leffler said.